Darkest Is The Hour

Starry is the night.

This pain I’d spare for change.

Accept it or reject it,

it’s either way the same.

Misty comes the morning.

An afternoon of rain.

It’s quiet in the evening,

but isn’t that the way?

To offer one protection.

A coat from bustling wind.

If only could my doorstep,

provide the warmth within.

Though darkest is the hour.

The brightest star may fall.

I dare not wish upon it,

but marvel still in awe.

How elegant it sounds.

Sweet agony by dawn.

When days aren’t worth repeating,

who am I in your sky?

The Way Which We Evolve.

If you look around you’ll notice

certain things are dirty

and certain things are clean.

If everything was dirty,

chances are you’d notice nothing.

If everything was clean, well

you’d notice everything that wasn’t.

I’ll never fully understand the anatomy of women.

Or what it means to be a man.

I’ll never fully comprehend

the way which we evolve.

If stones don’t throw themselves, what’s all this broken glass?

If architects were certain, would houses not be built to last?

So if by chance you notice

everything that wasn’t.

Chances are you’ll notice, that light reveals nothing.

Just empty rooms with empty shelves.

Just echoes full of dust.

Just empty rooms with unlocked doors

we dare not walk through twice.

Hands Of Fate

I pull back the curtain to let in a little light

noticing that here, now, there is no longer

a table to be turned.

There is no longer a reason to be angry,

or moral, or burnt out by the frailty

of others actions or in-action.

What’s worse is I no longer find it funny,

but just a little sad, that, all the while

I’d been searching for something,

something in everyone (something I’d lost?)

that could never be theirs to give.

It’s become almost impossible to ignore

this benign neutrality that begs the question,

for whose benefit has this effort, my effort,

really ever been for?

And it’s then I start to slip away

like specs of dust my memory’s carried

through light and sound and everything else

that no one but myself can reason.

So I open the curtain just half an inch more

to allow a little light in, where here, now

there is no more to explain—

no weight in which to carry.

When I shook the hands of fate, they offered me a parlay.

(I can’t ever get that back) But—

this much I can do.

Trinkets In A Storeroom

If I thought you had no value

I’d let you fall apart.

Like trinkets in a storeroom

To once belonged a heart.

In worlds so unforgiving

where love’s a dying art,

it’s natural to be painted

like Van Gogh in the dark.

See candle light can guide you

but only goes so far,

don’t look beyond the shadows

for beatings of the heart.

For if you had no value

I’d let their theories win.

Like trinkets in a storeroom

Whose worth is found within.

The Luxuries We Choose.

Forty-nine and a half days.

Twenty pages a day—

give or take longer stretches

of concentrated time.

While daunting in it’s infancy,

like running a marathon,

the question here is why?

Wallace described it as a healthier alternative.

King describes it as something to do while uninspired.

I’ll combine the two and for now conclude

it has something to do with maturity and choice.

Now consider the marathon,

where focus is key.

Regulated breathing—essential.

Where urgency is relative.

Because in a marathon,

like most voluntary acts—

where signing up is reason alone for celebration—

no one but yourself cares when you finish.

Now how bout that for a strange commitment?

How bout that for a selfish investment?

Cut off from the world at large

in a room of isolation—

their pain’s not mine to heal.

With forty-nine and half days left.

Forty-nine and half days that,

we’ll live and make excuses for

the luxuries we choose.

Books And Tangled Wires

I don’t know why we come here

and treat it like our home.

With books and tangled wires

keeping, private thoughts our own.

Do we come just to be served?

To feel like we’ve been missed?

We zone-out till our name is called

like spoiled little kids.

I don’t know why we come here

or why we stay so long.

With earbuds in we’re locked

away, to each his silent song.

Do we stay for the attention?

To feel like we’re a part?

Then judge our neighbor blindly

like, mockery’s an art.

I don’t know why we come here.

I feel most alone.

With books and tangled wires.

Was home this far from home?

The Wythe Hotel

Sitting alone in the banquet hall, I can’t help but think, I know this smell.

Antibacterial soap.

Citrus.

And old water that I used to wash away the evening laughter, spilled drinks, and half eaten hors d’oeurves.

From the kitchen comes the smell of New York.

The smell of Maine.

It’s the smell of unserved duck and bison left out for the wait staff to take home.

Here, at the LA Proper, it smells exactly like the Wythe Hotel, in it’s unforgettable daytime gloom.

Where as a porter I’d use a damp cloth to clean the sconces. Blue liquid to clean the high-tops. And a pink substance—no one knew the specifics of—to mop the weathered floors.

Where as a porter I learned to bite my tongue, leave my pride at the door, and accept the minimum wage for minimum effort.

Ah, what sights there are to see in Brooklyn, and be there no better way than to see them than for 600 dollars a night!

Ah, what local fare there is to taste off the butchers block in Maine—Rosemont Market— where I too learned that minimum effort guaranteed minimum results—pairing cheese with port. I sold ribeye no Mainer could afford.

Where as a deli clerk I trained under a butcher who dreamed of owning his own knife shop and who secretly loathed his private affairs.

What lies between the swinging of an open/closed door, but a thousand emotions, a thousand dreams, and a thousand questions—we choose not to solve.

Yet here, in the banquet hall, I’m sure I know this smell.

And it serves as a vast reminder—that time is fragile, and outlook is imperative.

To know exactly what I’m doing, and why I’m doing it.

To take the bad with the good, and know nothing is permanent.

Listening To Brian

He says his name is Brian.

That he’s been addicted to heroine and meth for 30 years

but woke up a year and 8 months ago,

decided to get clean,

and has been ever since.

He wants to know why he can’t get closer to our film set.

So I tell him it’s nothing personal, that it’s protocol.

He says he’s taking courses provided by

The California Department of Rehabilitation.

That he likes to edit video, how his instructor is very supportive

but he only likes to edit the things he shoots—

how some days he wakes up with extreme anxiety,

depression, and can’t get the idea out of his head

that he’s going to die.

He wants to know what PM stands for and why the woman in gray told him he couldn’t hang around the cameras.

I tell him that means Production Manager, and that she’s the production manager.

He maintains balance with his walker, and says he understands.

He says the hardest part wasn’t getting sober, but that after he did he realized that he really had no one.

No friends. No lover. No family.

I try to get a word in edgewise, but know it’s not my place.

He talks a while longer before wrap is called, then asks my name.

I tell him that it’s David.

That he should be proud of himself for the changes he’s made.

We shake hands and say goodbye.

For the next two hours I pick up other people’s garbage, wrap cable, and load a production truck full of equipment.

For the next two hours until now

I think of Brian, my life, and what we have in common.

Is it the night that’s hard to get through?

Or the day that’s just the same?

He says his name is Brian.

I hope he’s doing well.

Hideaway

In the evening it’s quiet

and all so overwhelming,

how the floorboards creak—

listening to music,

the refrigerator hums.

It feels like Winter in West Haven.

Summer in Black Point.

It feels like sleepovers on Hill Street.

Has the world forgotten us?

Or have we just found relief?

A little sort of hideaway

that no one else can see.

So I pour a cup of coffee—

do all I can to stay awake.

For now the storm has passed.

And all that trickles in

from the window that’s been open,

are the cooing sounds of morning

that no more than a sneeze could break.

Our Wedding Day

Today I marry my best friend.

Who even in our times of separation

has never left my side.

Do you know how truly special you are?

Because I do.

Allow me to explain.

For years I tried to deny my love

curiosity, and admiration for you.

For years I tried to keep you

buried like treasure, in poetry and words—

(so sure that one day you’d forget me)

For years I was a fool

desperate for attention, and scared to tell the truth.

Do you ever feel ugly or impossible to love?

Like no matter how hard you try,

there’s always this voice urging you to quit?

What boggles my mind most

is how long I spent pretending.

Trying everything I could

to become something that I wasn’t.

Believing that if I kept us a secret

I wouldn’t have to face reality.

The reality that I am a sweet, honest man.

The reality that I am dignified and true.

The reality that no matter how hard I’ve tried to forget—

you’ve never forgotten me, and I’ve never forgotten you.

So today, I marry my best friend.

The sweetest person I’ve ever known.

You’re the love of my life.

You’re the fire to my stone.

And now, my love

we are free to do anything.